Aleksandra Walaszek – SAIC Graduate Exhibition 2024

SAIC SHOWS 2024 GRADUATE EXHIBITIONS

Graduates

SAIC SHOWS 2024 GRADUATE EXHIBITIONS

Aleksandra Walaszek

Master of Fine Arts in Studio, Fiber and Material Studies

Graduate Exhibition One

ale.walaszek@gmail.com

Walaszek is an interdisciplinary artist, based in Chicago, born in Wroclaw, Poland. She holds an MA in Media Arts (2011) from Eugeniusz Geppert Academy of Art in Wroclaw. During her studies she was awarded exchange stays at ESAD in Strasbourg, France and MICA in Baltimore, US. Wałaszek is a co-founder of an artist-run space Forma Otwarta Oleśnica, Poland. She has received several scholarships including the Fulbright Graduate Student Award. Her works have been exhibited in various venues, including the Strasbourg Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, WRO Media Art Biennale among others. She has been Artist-in-Residence at [R.A.T.] in Mexico City, 18th Street Arts Center in Santa Monica, USA, Centre for Creative Activities in Ustka, Poland; AIR Wro in San Sebastián, Spain; Paradise AIR in Matsudo, Japan. Wałaszek tends to focus on subjects such as: identity, and history. Her work has involved the creation of conceptually based objects, video, installations as well as happenings.

Aleksandra Walaszek - Down Below

Down Below, 2022, Site-specific mixed media installation

“Down Below” provides access to the protected underground Chicago infrastructure, and invites guests on a series of strolls accompanied by a custom audio guide and highlighted by a red carpet situated in between historic rails. Located on 33 East Washington St., this site-specific installation became a part of the larger history of the underground Chicago. The building called: Washington, currently belonging to SAIC used to be a part of a network of freight tunnels and until today it carries traces of its layered history. “Down Below” consists of a long, custom tufted carpet fitted in between the historical rails along with an audio guide created for this particular space. The artist’s voice, as an audio guide, weaves historical facts and personal stories activating the walk within the building and artwork simultaneously.

Aleksandra Walaszek - Dual Purpose Object

Dual Purpose Object, 2023, Object, carpet grippers, wood

“Aleksandra Wałaszek’s Dual Purpose Object is a sculptural cube composed out of repurposed carpet grippers. Commonly used to fix carpets in place and provide stability, this use of found objects makes the work accrue a sense of violence and precarity. The viewer is confronted with a simple question: what exactly is the second purpose in question? Through guiding us to this question, Wałaszek exhibits a covert ability of art. Namely, the ability to expose layers of meaning where none were expected. The exhibited work exposes reality for not being singular but rather richly laminated and folded onto itself. The hierarchies of value we learn to parse through our daily realities often obscure latent interpretations and potentials. Wałaszek’s sculpture destabilizes such hierarchies. Just as stained glass comes into glory under light, so do layers of meaning hiding in plain sight.” Michał Dzitko

Aleksandra Walaszek - Pic Nic

Pic Nic, 2011, Site specific installation. Collaboration with Oliwia Beszczyńska, picture by Peter Kreibich

Installation made for the SURVIVAL 9-Art Review, Wroclaw, Poland with a theme: “When parks become an arena”. The modern park fulfills the function of the city’s living room – its open space encourages the common human tendency to strut around and expose oneself to public view. By making this work we wanted to restore the original functions of the park as a city garden. The PIC NIC project revitalized the idea of a social meeting in nature. By using red striped blankets, we were creating a place which we hoped would be an intimate but open arena for actors-participants. The PIC NIC project was a social encounter, organized or accidental, it was the background for a possible event, a perfect excuse to make new acquaintances, fitting, replacing and matching.

Aleksandra Walaszek - Mobile Museum

Mobile Museum, 2020, Series of happenings. Collaboration with Sam Stevens. Picture by Ala Savashevich

Mobile Museum is a platform to show the potential of narrative – a movable frame presenting the stories of Wroclaw’s inhabitants through personal items. The goal of the project was to reflect on the history of place through everyday life. The initiative was based on an exchange of things infused with sentimental value by their (former) owners. Items were collected during workshops and regular meetings held around Wroclaw over the course of three months in July-September 2020. Each souvenir passing through the Museum was photographed, described, and archived online. The Mobile Museum project started as a collection of important and less important things, which seasoned with specific stories, became unique. The souvenirs went out into the world, began to travel and live their own life; taking with them a piece of this place.

STICK AND A PIECE OF CLOTH (exercise for beginners), 2021, Video loop, 1920 × 1080
This short video was filmed in the fields where I grew up, a small village in south-western Poland. The field – “pole” is the root word for Poland – “Polska”. Therefore I find it as a fundamental ingredient of the work that shows an exercise inspired by the tai chi sword practiced for defense training and health benefits. Repetition of movements performed with a stick and a piece of cloth resembling polish flag is an exercise and a question of transgressing the thin line between patriotism and nationalism.

The body of my works is conceived through collaboration or as a result of silent observation. I create in-between locations and media. My work involves conceptual objects and installations. Coming from a liminal geography is what keeps me searching for thresholds and bridges, obvious and dubious.